The present disclosure relates generally to the field of graphical imaging systems.
Depth of field is a portion of a scene as viewed through a lens that appears acceptably sharp in the image. A lens can only precisely focus at one distance and decreases in sharpness occur on each side of the focused distance. In other words, objects within a lens's depth of field appear as in-focus, while objects closer or further than the depth of field will appear out of focus.
In some applications it is desirable to simulate the effects of depth of field in a computer generated image. For example, some modern flight simulators can be used not only to simulate an out-the-window scene, but also an image presented in the cockpit by an optics-based (e.g., lens-based) sensor. It is challenging and difficult to simulate depth of field effects in an efficient manner (e.g., suitable for real-time applications such as flight simulation).